Something you may or may not have known...

[waldo]

This would make since if things were getting easier with progression. Sure, hunts are easy.. And maybe a few other world events like this, but for the most part progression gets harder and harder.

Example would be ex primal fights, with few exceptions as content is released the fights are at least more complex. Maybe this isn't 'harder' but it's for sure not a 'nerf'.

Another example is coil progression. Now I'm no pro in coil, but you'd be making a very poor argument if you said 1-5 were harder than 6-9.

It is a rational fear I suppose that *new* content will be made easier as the game progresses, but as of now it's not the case.
Adding an echo buff in turn 5 isn't exactly game breaking for the new content, especially considering everything in turn 5 is obsolete by soldiery and 6-9. Sure it makes it easier, but not the same as adding dumbed down new content.

[Almalexia]

If he listens to the input of the players on the forums and most of the posts consist of players whining and complaining about ANY type of challenge put into the game, what do you think is going to happen?(and don't even try to argue it doesn't when there's literally 50+ threads already, complaining about Atma,coils, and the EX primal fights popping up in the last 3 weeks.)

EX primals have been in the game for, what, 9 months now?

And people have been complaining about EX primals for, what, 9 months now?

And nothing in the EX primal fights has been changed for, what, 9 months now?

I don't think you have anything to worry about.

[Bucy]

I actually haven't seen any posts complaining things are too hard. I have seen posts resenting the grindiness of certain portions of the relic quests. I've seen post about the inequity of hunts, and how they incentivize hacks. I've seen posts about the excessive use of RNG in systems. I've seen posts about changing the focus in coils/raids from memorizing unforgiving mechanics to various other things.

I too want to see challenging content, but I think many people are tired of the gimmicks. I'm also tired of the pandering to the unskilled.

The final Beast tribe quest is a great example.(Spoilers):
-I got excited I may get to have a solo boss fight with a character claiming to be the greatest, but in the end I only got to fight 2 lakeys and watch a cut scene of the boss fight. I was very disappointed. I wanted to have a challenging fight.-

[Colt47]

The problem WoW had is that they didn't understand what the feedback meant. They thought people wanted easier content when the reality was the player base wanted ways to access all the content. Final Fantasy XIV is making the same mistakes WoW did at its inception by creating exclusive content catering to a specific part of the audience, then not giving the rest of the player populace a way to access that same content at a level that makes sense for them. There is story in Coil right now and only a sliver of the populace is even getting to see it, for example.

It's not even about entitlement anymore with this kind of thing: some players really like FFXIV, but have real life commitments preventing them from doing static runs with groups to get through and see the story in coil 2. So what are they supposed to do other than play second fiddle to a sliver of the total gaming population and get aggravated by it. Then they have that sliver calling them whiners and complainers, which is like watching an entitled rich person calling a blue collar worker a lazy snob.

[Galgarion]

It's the summer lull. Wow hasn't released any new content in nearly eight months. All they've ever shed is a fleshy coating of superfluous casual players. They have a core subscriber base of addicted, life-deferring maniacs who refuse to stop playing. Good for them, I guess. Their numbers will spike back up when their expansion releases, then slowly peter out over the next two years.

Who cares? I like this game better. Nothing good can come from following the wisdom of hardcore players who burn through difficult content faster than developers can put it out, then spend the majority of the time complaining about casuals ruining everything.

[Ulathskullsplitter]

It's simple numbers. There are far more players that prefer the game to be easy so they can relax while playing, get their loot, and feel like they accomplished something. It's a very small percent of players that like to bang their heads against difficult encounters for weeks or even months before being able to beat it. Most people don't find being frustrated fun. These companies are going to follow the money.

And woe to FFXIV if it follows Wows path. Peaking at 12 million subscribers and maintaining 5+ million for almost a decade. That would just be a terrible fate for this game. Clearly nobody wants easy content.

[Jynx]

My issues isn't about difficulty it's about community.

The games design is pretty much the anti-thesis of community building. Something that's key to any MMO.

Cross server grouping, lockouts, easymode crafting and gathering, everything is at anyones fingertips. No work has to really go into being a master crafter, gatherer, or player of X job. The developers go out of there way to make everything be the path of least resistance with the only bar to content is either a rediculous grind ala atma or locking people out from playing content more than once a week making them unable to help anyone outside their 8 man group.

Cooperation between players (aside static groups) is not encouraged nor is it rewarded. This is what needs to change.

[Magis]

It's simple numbers. There are far more players that prefer the game to be easy so they can relax while playing, get their loot, and feel like they accomplished something. It's a very small percent of players that like to bang their heads against difficult encounters for weeks or even months before being able to beat it. Most people don't find being frustrated fun. These companies are going to follow the money.

And woe to FFXIV if it follows Wows path. Peaking at 12 million subscribers and maintaining 5+ million for almost a decade. That would just be a terrible fate for this game. Clearly nobody wants easy content.

The path FFXIV is "following" is post-Wrath, when WoW began dropping subs left and right. Even Cataclysm and Pandaria couldn't bring in players or sustain them long enough (just small blips). Now if XIV was more like Vanilla and TBC, well... that would be a different story.

http://users.telenet.be/mmodata/Charts/Subs-1.png

[Cylla]

The problem WoW had is that they didn't understand what the feedback meant. They thought people wanted easier content when the reality was the player base wanted ways to access all the content. Final Fantasy XIV is making the same mistakes WoW did at its inception by creating exclusive content catering to a specific part of the audience, then not giving the rest of the player populace a way to access that same content at a level that makes sense for them. There is story in Coil right now and only a sliver of the populace is even getting to see it, for example.


It's not even about entitlement anymore with this kind of thing: some players really like FFXIV, but have real life commitments preventing them from doing static runs with groups to get through and see the story in coil 2. So what are they supposed to do other than play second fiddle to a sliver of the total gaming population and get aggravated by it. Then they have that sliver calling them whiners and complainers, which is like watching an entitled rich person calling a blue collar worker a lazy snob.

^ This right here. And although later on WoW did start making raids where everyone of every level could see the content and enjoy it, by that time it was to late and they had already lost half their player base. This was towards the end of Cata. I get to fed up with not being able to do the new coils and being able to see it when the content comes out. No, I get to see it when it opens up to DF and I can que solo or with a few people. I have a static right now, but they haven't even moved in to T6 yet because we've had people either not showing up at all or bailing when we have to move new people up through the old coils and none of the vet raiders want anything to do with that or to help people. So since the release of SBoC I've beaten T6, that it. I've done a bit of T7 and that as far as it goes. I do like that WoW actually had started making the raid content open to everyone through their party finder and if you wanted to do the hardcore that where you got a static or guild to do them raids. Sure the DF raids in WoW were super easy mode and the stats were dumb down on the gear that dropped, but at least I got to see the content and not have to wait 6 to 8 months to ever see it or go looking for a static that I had no time for or may not work out.

[Ulathskullsplitter]

The path FFXIV is "following" is post-Wrath, when WoW began dropping subs left and right. Even Cataclysm and Pandaria couldn't bring in players or sustain them long enough (just small blips). Now if XIV was more like Vanilla and TBC, well... that would be a different story.

http://users.telenet.be/mmodata/Charts/Subs-1.png

When are people going to stop using subscriber numbers from early WoW as the barometer for success for mmos? That was just one of those flukey cultural phenomenon that was never going to be sustainable and will never happen again. You can't necessarily make the connection that numbers dropped due to content. It was never going to retain that many players regardless of the path they took with it. And in this day there are far too many options for one game to gain that many subscribers again. Almost every game that releases now has some kind of online multiplayer.